First Sonata
by Miko-chan
Summary: Every song has its end. [AU.SasuSaku.Oneshot]


**First Sonata **  
by **Miko-chan**  
**Standard Disclaimers Apply  
Summary:** Every song has its end. (AU)

* * *

A young woman of twenty-one sits on a tall stool, a small clay cup in her hands as supple lips sips from its soft edge. Her back to the busy, chattering crowd, knowing that no one will even dare to disturb her. Every poor soul knows that this lady is someone you must not engage in small talk, no matter how enthralling she is. There is something about the way she carries herself--from the way she arranges her back straight and stunning intoxicating olive green glares--that makes her infamous to the resident customers of this part of the town.

It attracts a certain eye from the crowd.

The slender, coral-haired woman is surprised upon being called unexpectedly to the stage, aware that she dines alone on a lonely stool in the bar. In one fluid motion, she slowly rises to her stiletto-clad feet and walks unto the small steps towards the platform. Her sight tells her in an instant that no one notices her as each person of the crowd is preoccupied with some business or other.

That huge, grandiose thing stands before her, tauntingly tempting her.

"Can you play?" A young man asks in her proximity, his presence known with the fleeting intensity she felt behind. She is inquired with a simple question. She knows she can answer it truthfully but she would rather not acknowledge it.

Instead, she runs partially ink-stained fingers over the spines of its black keys and sits on the dusty old chair. It gives a slight, tired groan from the shift of her weight. The unspoken invitation is taken into consideration. Soon enough, the music plays from her hands.

His mouth lingers on the rim of the glass, ice tumbling down on the clear alcohol.

"When did you learn?" She fails to notice the abrupt twinge in his face, as he is behind her.

"That is when I learned to sing." Her answer is relaxed with a cynical smile.

"I see." He settles the empty glass on the black expanse of the mahogany piano.

In her childhood, her voice would usually hit the high notes cracking, her words inaudible, only whispered beneath the soft thickness of her damp pillows. She extended her pale arms in the air, as if expecting her make believe crowd applauding at her feat. They were merely made up fantasies when she was feeling a bit egoistic (for her, she believed) to either soothe her childish nightmares or discover something wonderful that no one ever noticed.

No one ever knew she bought old songbooks with what was left of her measly allowance. Nobody took note of her humming newly made tunes from her head while she sat alone reading. Her closed lips, always bursting to sing in most humdrum moments, were kept shut and she spent those moments of silence in pondering thoughts.

Music is something that humans cannot live without. She always thought of that, as she dealt with her bruises and wounds with a ballad playing behind her wide forehead. The unspoken words would heal the stinging tears and her lithe arms wrapping around her shaking body never, ever failed to lift her up.

When one always does acapella, it is easy to go out of tune.

It is more practical to have another melody to follow. When she met him she finally realized that she could no longer sing alone. She was truly grateful that he provided her the existence of beats and time, no matter how fast the tempo was between them. Their music might have been a bit imperfect and unpredictable, but at least they made a unique, pleasant harmony.

But as all songs, there comes the time when it must cease playing.

It was during that certain aspect of her life that she finally sang for a single audience.

_I love you with all my heart!_

It was all wrong.

_I will give you anything! _

It came on the incorrect notes; it was not in tune with what she really meant to sing.

_Don't leave._

She knew that her voice was too small to be heard. All of those efforts, trying to make him stay with her and making it work, ended in sobs and in whimpered cries. She did not even know why she sang in that awful state. However, she often hoped that she might still reach him.

Time has passed her so quickly, yet it always agonizingly slows down whenever she plays. The lyrics were always about the stories of her and him under the moon and lantern lit roads. It was all about tearing herself into shreds and putting them all back together in one rising pitch. She always tried to overlook that it will strike a chord in her every time she did this but could not stop humming about forgotten hymns of tears and pain a-and...

"Stop that." He harshly cuts in like a blade through her thoughts. Notes abruptly crash down as her startled hands press together. The rose-colored tresses cover the slight blush on her pale cheeks as she remembers that she is on a platform. However, his stern voice again prevents her from thinking. "Stop staring off into space."

"I'm sorry." She replies with a smile. It is always deceiving, nevertheless effective.

The melody she plays loops again on the deafening silence that filled the air the moment ago.

"Is this song hard to learn?" The tone that reprimanded her hard earlier changed into muted tones.

"No." There is another empty upward movement of those cherry lips.

The cream, candle-like fingers gently skim the bitter cold white ivories and linger on the musky dark ebonies. _Such an amazing instrument_, her mind muses. _Ancient and grand_, even the settled dust cannot take away its effect of stealing her breath away. _Just like him_, her head then complies with her traitorous emotion.

Her fingers splay in graceful arcs over the keys, pouring over notes. Her hands create endless melodies as her eyes close to listen to everything that the unknown piece is telling. They continue to overflow and create something out of broken voices and cracked songs that she heard in the past. It is a little surprising, somehow, that out of all those hundreds of pieces, he managed to produce this.

A reflection of what she still feels for him. A mirror of what he felt for her.

She curses herself. She is twenty-one, and has become accustomed more to the ways of music than she ever thought she would. These notes are no longer the cure to her pain. They are weapons. Something can be used against you, as well be utilized by others.

Glittering onyx eyes--eerily deep and frightening-- now painfully stare at her.

"Who wrote this?"

"I don't know." She answers now honestly. "Someone wrote it."

"What are you playing?"

She pushes a key harder than usual.

"This song," Her mouth whispers, then her arms were nearly wide. She reaches the highest keys, the climax finally coming to an end. "... is something that I should try to forget." It is also humiliating, like a slap to her face, to know that she could never, ever forget him. Finally, she halts the motion of the haunting yet refreshing melody.

"Why did you stop?" he asks.

The woman blinks rapidly as she stares off in some other direction rather than at the man who sits beside her. "I don't know how it ends."

He had deserted everything in shambles, leaving her everything in shambles. The rhythm was suddenly out of her life and she just found herself awake on that same drenched pillows with cracked notes. This time, however, no amount of songs and instruments could ease her agitated spirit. All she had now was ruined pens, shred compositions and silent, broken evenings.

This song always remained unstable, and it will always remain that way in her hands.

He settles himself comfortably beside her as the fading red cushion accommodates him. She ignores the way he glowers at her, burning her insides. She hears him draw a calm breath as he speaks.

"You could play it more perfectly than I imagined."

Her distraught jaded eyes suddenly widen in astonishment as he stretches his left hand to continue the incomplete melody. The only copy of this half-made composition is in her locked drawer, along with tear-stained symphonies and a crumpled picture of a stoic young man, face set in a frown, she has loved for the past five years.

In the dim orange light from the corner, she can barely make out his features, yet she knows that she knew him somewhere before. She cannot distinguish the stranger before her but when she finally thoroughly locks gazes with those onyx orbs she slowly recognizes with apprehension. The fact that those unruly dark azure-black strands sticking out at the side of his head, the way that he gracefully glides his fingers over the keys as if they were blurring blades in the shadows...

It is hypnotizing and drowning her at the same time, making the bile in her throat rise in realization.

The feeling of foolishness and embarrassment rises up so quickly that she cannot decide whether she should throw him that empty shot glass or let those stinging drops fall from her already brimming eyes.

At that point, she finally decides on the former before the latter take control of her.

"Basta--!"

"You know enough of what is next." He impatiently retorts. "Finish it."

The scream dies in her throat as he gently grasps her right hand as if in reluctant apology. Nevertheless, there is something different as he places it beside him and gives her a silent warning to end the damn song.

_(betaed by SailorZelda/edited on 01/30/06--First Entry to the Simply Love Contest)_


End file.
